


I Remember You

by MaryEvH



Category: Les Misérables (2012), Les Misérables - All Media Types
Genre: F/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-23
Updated: 2016-04-23
Packaged: 2018-06-04 01:34:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,311
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6635659
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MaryEvH/pseuds/MaryEvH
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Éponine and Enjolras have been married for 60 years, but Éponine is now declining from severely advanced Alzehimer's. However, Enjolras is there to comfort her in her final moments of life. Enjonine AU one-shot, General Audiences.</p>
            </blockquote>





	I Remember You

It was about 1:00 in the afternoon when Enjolras got the phone call. He hobbled over to the ringing receiver; at 82, his mobility was not what it once was. Luckily, he reached the phone just in time.

“Hello?”

“Mr. Enjolras?” the familiar voice of a nurse asked on the other end of the line. “It’s Marissa; I’m your wife’s caretaker at the nursing home.”

“Yes, how are you, dear?” the old man asked, settling into his armchair with the phone.

“I’m doing quite well…I’m calling about your wife, Éponine.”

Enjolras bit his lip. This couldn’t be good. “How is she?”

Marissa sighed. “Sir, we think she’s in her last moments. If you’d like to come down to the nursing home to be with her when she…passes…”

“I’m on my way now,” he said in a determined voice, standing up with some effort. “Thank you for calling.” He hung up the phone with a quiet sigh, and tried to hold back his tears. They had married when they were 20 and 22, just after he finished his law degree, and when she was in her second year of university. In the 60 years they’d been married, they had four children, 10 grandchildren and 3 great-grandchildren. But over the last few years, Alzheimer’s had slowly taken away the woman he loved. When it finally got too hard for him to take care of her, he’d forced himself to put her in a nursing home. She couldn’t even recognize his face.

He made the familiar drive to the nursing home, trying to remember the happier times they had together, before the disease took her away. It had been so cruel for him, for their children and grandchildren, to watch the illness slowly destroy the wonderful, beloved woman – wife, mother and grandmother – that they had come to know and love.

Enjolras parked the car, walked slowly over to the building, checked in at the desk, as he had done so many times before. What was different about this visit was that the nurse to whom he’d spoken on the phone was immediately there to take him to Éponine.

“She fell asleep just before we called,” Marissa said as she carefully guided the old man to his wife’s room. “She was awake this morning and part of the afternoon, and somewhat lucid. Her breathing slowed down after she went to sleep.” He nodded, barely hearing what the nurse was saying. All he could think about was Éponine – he wondered if she would be awake again when he got there, or if she would still be sleeping. Would she have one of her rare lucid moments, or would she again ask him who he was, and why he was there to see her?

Finally, they made it to her bedside.

Even in the few years she’d been in the nursing home, Enjolras hadn’t before seen his wife quite this still. She was clearly still breathing, two tubes going up her nostrils, and a heart monitor was beeping over her head. He stood at the foot of the bed for just a moment with the nurse, looking at her and remembering the 20-year-old girl he fell in love with all those years ago.

“I’ll leave you two alone now,” she said gently as she guided Enjolras to a chair next to the left side of the bed.

The old man nodded. “Thank you.” He looked at Éponine as she lay there sleeping, and he remembered…their first date, their first kiss, his proposal, their wedding, the day their first child was born…all the happy things they’d gone through together. Now, at the end of it all, he was just where he belonged, at her side.

He took her left hand, creased with age, into his own wrinkled one, and noticed how cold it was. The gold band he’d put on her fourth finger all those years ago was still there; her skin had grown old around it. He clasped her cold hand in his warm ones and began to sing softly. His voice was a little shakier now than it had been when he was a young man, but still he sang to her – the song that had always been Éponine’s favorite, that had been their first dance at their wedding, and that he sang to her when they first got the diagnosis, and she was crying on his chest, telling him how much she didn’t want to forget.

 

_Was it in Tahiti?_

_Were we on the Nile?_

_Long, long ago,_

_Say an hour or so_

_I recall that I saw your smile._

And that was exactly how it started – from across the main room at the Café, he had seen her laughing at some stupid joke a friend had told her, and he had been captured by that beautiful smile.

_I remember you,_

_You’re the one who made_

_My dreams come true_

_A few kisses ago._

In his mind’s eye, he remembered their first kiss, their kiss on their wedding day, and every time her lips had touched his since then. He held her wrinkled hand a little tighter, gently stroking the back of it as he continued to sing softly to her.

_I remember you,_

_You’re the one who said_

_“I love you, too,” I do._

_Didn’t you know?_

He remembered the day her memory started to fade, and then the day they went to the doctor and got the worst news of their lives. She’d held it together until they made it through the front door, before she broke down in tears, telling him over and over that she didn’t want to forget.

 

_I remember, too,_

_A distant bell,_

_And stars that fell like rain_

_Out of the blue._

He remembered, in the years before he had her put in the nursing home, walking her around their house every morning, telling her who he was over and over, pointing out their children in the pictures on the walls. It broke his heart every day to see her so bewildered by things that had once made her so happy.

 

_When my life is through,_

_And the angels ask me to recall_

_The thrill of them all,_

_Then I shall tell them…_

_I remember you._

Enjolras had to keep a few tears from welling up in his eyes. It was so hard to believe, after 60 years together, that she was going to die. Even though he’d lost the woman his wife used to be years ago, he’d still gone to visit her in the nursing home almost every week. Now, her body would be gone, too.

He pushed those thoughts back and kept singing. He was going to be strong for her one more time.

 

_I remember, too,_

_A distant bell,_

_And stars that fell like rain_

_Out of the blue._

As he took a breath for the final verse, he was shocked to hear his wife’s voice finish the song for him.

 

_When my life is through,_

_And the angels ask me to recall_

_The thrill of them all,_

_Then I shall tell them…_

_I remember…you._

Her eyes were open, she was looking at him, and she was smiling at him for the first time in years. His heart nearly skipped a beat. “Éponine?” he whispered hopefully. Now, Enjolras was unable to keep his eyes from misting; they were about to overflow.

“I love you, Enjolras,” she whispered weakly, squeezing his hand.

He was thunderstruck, but somehow he managed to gently squeeze her hand in his, kissing her forehead one last time, before her eyes closed, and her last breath left her with a smile. Enjolras let his silent tears fall, her last words ringing in his ears.

_“I love you, Enjolras.”_

At the very last, she had remembered him again. And for that, he would be eternally thankful.


End file.
